


how'd i get here sitting next to you

by alamorn



Series: sudden moves [1]
Category: Suicide Squad (2016)
Genre: Backstory, Gen, mentioned and non explicit sexual harassment of a minor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-07
Updated: 2017-01-07
Packaged: 2018-09-15 10:12:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9230372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alamorn/pseuds/alamorn
Summary: The road from vigilante to hitman is painted with other people's blood.





	

He was sixteen, when the Bat started to beat his way through Gotham's nights. No one knew how to talk about him — a rich boy amusing himself with violence, a hero doing what the police won’t, a man, a monster — but in the end it didn’t much matter. Gotham adjusted. A few crimes were stopped in their tracks, but mostly what happened was that the crimes got _weirder_.

It didn’t affect Floyd’s block. Not really. It wasn’t the worst neighborhood, so it never got graced with Batman’s presence, back when the man, or monster, or whatever he was, had the time to go after normal crooks. There were empty buildings, and drugs, and regular shootings, but not as frequent as some parts of Gotham. It was no Crime Alley. Batman never set a boot in Floyd’s block.

So when the kid that lived a couple floors below him got killed for saying the wrong thing, or being in the wrong place, or looking at the wrong person — the story changed depending on who you asked. The only thing that was certain was that he died — Floyd knew three things. First, the police wouldn’t do anything. Second, neither would Batman. Third, he had a gun, and good aim.

It was easy. Easier than he expected. It was easy to find a place to wait. It was easy to sit for hours with his eyes kept wide. It was easy to pull the trigger, and watch as, a block away, a man crumpled to his knees, head a mess of red.

His hands didn’t shake. He didn’t throw up. He felt curiously numb, almost like he was floating.

 

Floyd had heard that violence only begets violence, but Floyd had good eyes. He could see an end. It was him. He wasn’t part of a gang. He was a ghost. He was death. The light, the way.

He got a better gun. He kept his ears open. He tattooed it on his arm as a reminder. _You cannot escape_. He wasn’t sure who he was telling.

It was hard work. Thankless. He didn’t have the money for fancy gear like Batman had. He didn’t make a fuss of himself like Batman did. They called him _Deadshot_ when they talked about him, but they didn’t talk about him much. Floyd was Gotham’s ghost. The dirty little secret. _Sh_.

Bad men sprouted holes in their foreheads. Maybe they would have been better, someday. Maybe they could have been put on the right path, but the right path didn’t find them. Floyd did. Floyd was not Jesus. Floyd did not forgive.

Then his girlfriend got pregnant.

Vigilantism didn’t pay.

He remembered…

The carefully clean kitchens where people told him their hurts and did not meet his eyes. The way he’d been offered money and said, “No,” went home and ate honor for dinner. Honor tasted fine, but it didn’t keep him full. He couldn’t put it away for the lean times.

He remembered…

When he was fifteen he killed for justice. When he was eighteen he made a habit of it.

This is how it started: a little girl, shaking and afraid. “He touched me,” she kept saying. “He touched me.”

Floyd didn’t see red. That would be an excuse. He saw a knife and he saw the man and then, only then, did he see red. Red on his hands, red on the blade, red on the street. He didn’t tell anyone, after. Burned his clothes, tossed the knife, walked the girl home from school every day until she told him she didn’t need it anymore.

This is how it continued: one dead boy becomes two dead boys. It was revenge, not justice, but what did Gotham know of justice?

He worked for Gotham for _years_ , _decades_ haunting the streets and Gotham never changed. He had showed no one the light, had not found the way.

The next time a man approached him about needing another man dead, he said, “What’s it worth to you?”

The time after that, he had a number.


End file.
